Apple worries that spy technology has been secretly added to the computer servers it buys

Apple's huge success with services like iTunes, the App Store,
and iCloud has a dark side.

Apple hasn't been able to build the all the data centers it needs
to run these enormous photo storage and internet services on
its own.

And it worries that some of the equipment and cloud services it
buys has been compromised by vendors who have agreed to put
"back door" technology for government spying, according to a
report from The
Information's Amir Efrati and Steve Nellis.

Apple has also been using cloud services from its rivals, namely
Amazon Web Services and Microsoft, to help it run these services.
And it reportedly just
signed a contract to use Google's cloud services as
well. Meanwhile, it has embarked on yet another
attempt to build more of its own data centers to handle all of
that, called Project McQueen, reports
Jordan Novet at VentureBeat, and the project is having a
rough go of it, reports The Information.

Still, Apple is motivated to design build its own
hardware, the same as Google and Amazon does, and run it on
its own for one pretty scary reason: security. It suspects
that the servers it has been ordering from others are being
captured during shipping, and backdoors added to them that
will make them susceptible to being hacked.

At one point, the company even had people taking photographs
of the motherboards in the computer servers it was using, then
mark down exactly what each chip was, to make sure everything was
fully understood.

As one person quoted by The Information says, designing and
building its own data center hardware is the easiest way to make
sure there's no "extracurricular" activity going on.

Apple has made a big deal about the privacy of its products,
and even agreed to battle the FBI in court to prevent a court
order forcing Apple to write special software to help unlock an
iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino shooters. Apple was
concerned that that order would set a precedent that would later
have forced it to weaken the built-in security on iPhones and
other products. The FBI recently asked to
cancel the first hearing in the court fight, as it apparently
has found a way to unlock the phone without Apple's help.